


what does it mean to be a family?

by moltenheart (flyingwiththewolves)



Category: Iron Fist (TV), The Defenders (Marvel TV)
Genre: Canon Temporary Character Death, Daddy Issues, Danny learning to grow up, Danny learning to take responsibility for mistakes and failures tbh, Family, Introspection, Team as Family
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-10-13
Updated: 2017-10-30
Packaged: 2019-01-16 23:12:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,487
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12352494
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flyingwiththewolves/pseuds/moltenheart
Summary: danny rand and an impossible search for family.





	1. slipping.

what does it mean to be a family? he thought he knew, back before he lost everything for the first time. he had his father, his mother. he and ward were never close, but joy was like a sister. harold: an uncle. and in one fell swoop, his world was yanked out from beneath him. stranded in a new land, surrounded by strangers and new ways of living, he began to question the notion of FAMILY.

so many years spent training, learning, growing. was  _this_  family? those people who told you how to live, what to strive for? they set limits, dictated your life, your choices, and for what? because they loved him? there was love there. _mutual_ , danny reassured himself upon further examination of his heart. but this could not be family. there had to be more than this. and so, he left, back to search out those final ties to the family he lost.

YOUNG GOD in a city of the INDIFFERENT. daniel rand was not welcomed back with open arms. abandoned his new family to seek out the old and was there too rejected, where was he to go? ward became a BUSINESS PARTNER, davos an ADVERSARY. k’un lun vanished, new york uncaring. joy was nowhere to be found. it fell to the daughter of the dragon and the night nurse to care for the immortal iron fist’s childish heart.

that is, until he met THEM. though barely a week was spent together, it did not dampen his eager heart. a family DAMAGED, but a family nonetheless. he’s attached almost from their first fight together. the devil of hell’s kitchen, the unbreakable man, the women who saw too much. perhaps this is where he could belong, a family with which his struggles would be UNDERSTOOD. 

without meaning to, he begins to think of them as such. had his war against the hand not been so PERSONAL, he may have forsaken his duty to keep them together, to save what little family he had scraped together. and in the end, as families tended to do around him, they began to disintegrate. matt murdock. they called him the devil, but danny knows he’s found his home among the angels he put his faith in. anyone could see the light in him. anyone, that is, except for matt himself. yet, his death pulls on threads already loose, dangerously close to unravelling the little bit of happy chaos that has shaped danny’s lift for the past week.

the family that created him: gone. the family that raised him: gone. the family forged in fire: slipping through his fingers.

he cannot let that happen.


	2. legacy.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> danny rand has known many fathers in his lifetime. matt murdock was no father, but here he was, leaving another legacy at the feet of danny rand.

danny rand has known many fathers in his lifetime. the first he loved the hardest, mourned the longest. his father’s body, smashed against the rocks, was a picture that never truly left him. it haunted him in nightmares, shadowed him in waking. the man who gave him LIFE, who left a legacy worth billions of dollars. taken by what danny believed, for a time, to be chance. ( _he should have known: chance is rarely so cruel_. ) 

lei kung was the next. for fifteen years he followed him, let him dictate how DANNY RAND grew to manhood. he was bolstered by legends, the whispers of the child touched by fire. perhaps this was always meant to be. there were singes on his soul long before shou-lou’s red eyes pierced him for the first time. perhaps lei kung was meant to be his father. another legacy was passed to him, that of GUARDIAN. 

run, boy, run. from your responsibilities, the people you thought were family. abandon your duty, leave the pass unguarded. daniel rand returned to the place he once called home, a place he hadn’t known in over a decade. in his longing for his first father, he found another. HAROLD was never truly his relation, but how could danny deny what was being offered? love, acceptance, praise. in a storm of rejection and confusion, only harold offered shelter. only harold offered what his own father would have.

betrayals come fast and furious in this world. when the sickening squelch of metal impaling flesh tore through danny’s awareness, the reality set in. another father lost. another legacy inherited: the responsibility to put to right the damage the hand and his faux father had done. harold burned, and yet another duty settled on the shoulders of daniel rand. (  _he tried to escape again, but k’un lun was no longer there to save him. a duty failed, a city lost to childish whim_ s. )

new york is no nursery, and matt murdock is not a father. he fights until his hands are bleeding, keeps secrets at the expense of others. his priority is always the protection of the city, above his own life, even the lives of his comrades. so why does danny feel the need to win his approval? the elder stands at the window to the restaurant, bathed in red light he cannot see, and danny watches from the table. matt murdock saves lives, and what has he, the one blessed with the gift of shou-lou himself, done for this world? he has let a city crumble, neglected his duty. 

danny does not have the sole claim to childhood trauma. he listens gravely to how matt was robbed time and again: robbed of a mother, his sight, his father. and yet, he pulled himself up without a family fortune, with nothing but his mind and his skills. could danny say the same for himself? he stores the thought away for later as jessica and luke turn to another topic. 

_protect my city_. matt murdock would not survive the hand. as he pulled back, danny watched his face. matt’s jaw was a hard line, a warning not to tell the others. his hand slightly extended, even as he pulled back, a pleading to defend what daredevil no longer could. matt murdock was no father, but here he was, leaving another legacy at the feet of danny rand. _take up my mantle_ , matt was asking,  _continue my legacy_.

a dark shadow hung over his funeral. it wasn’t just his death that they all felt, but the uncertainty. could they speak now of daredevil, of the man who was demon to some, angel to others? danny recognized karen page, the reporter, sitting with matt’s lawyer friend with the blond hair. he didn’t recognize trish walker until he heard her mutter something to jessica: jessica who couldn’t take her eyes off of the floor beneath her boots. claire and luke sat near the front, him with his arm slung over her shoulders, her hunched so far down danny could barely see her.

there was no body to bury. only a small memorial before the altar. each of them took a moment to step forward, to say their goodbyes to new york’s defender. the scent of the candles reminded danny of warmth, of autumn days too cool to spend outdoors, and so were instead spent curled by the fire. he knelt at the memorial, his eyes finding the single picture of matthew murdock. his glasses obscured the warm eyes hiding just behind, and danny frowned at it. that was not the real matt murdock. the real matt murdock was _redder_.

“as long as the circle of existence lasts, may your happiness never decline.” the words are low, unable to be heard by those others still milling in the church, waiting to say their goodbyes. he’s not sure they would understand, given the catholic nature of matt’s faith.  ** _he_**   _would have understood_ , danny tells himself. “may you attain the constant joy of the bodhisattvas.” a hand is extended, resting on photo’s frame.

“i will protect your legacy, my friend.” matt murdock may not have been a father, but danny continued to learn from him. he had lost his city, his families, his purpose. but he was rebuilding. matt's legacy provided him with a little of each. perched later on the roof that night, danny found a smile slightly curling the corners of his mouth. perhaps not all legacies were burdens. perhaps they were the way to making your own.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> let me know what you think in the comments! anything you'd like to see me explore in upcoming chapters?


	3. human.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> claire temple has to be the most human person that he knows.

claire temple has to be the most **human person**  that he knows.

yet, danny finds himself lingering on her doorstop, unsure of whether or not to knock. in the end, he’s just turning away when he hears her call from inside. “ just  _come in_  already. “ curiosity pushes him forward, and he pokes his head inside the door.

“claire?”

“danny? come in already, would you?”

he follows her voice to the living room. she’s practically buried in books, eye lids drooping, eyes themselves ringed red. a half-eaten meal sits, now cold, on the coffee table. he lifts his eyebrows at the unusual amount of MESS in the apartment, where normally there’s at least organized chaos. he finds himself having to clear a spot to sit near her feet, piling another four books on the floor and out of the way.

“ how did you know it was me?” his voice is soft as he begs the question, studying her with something close to concern.

“after all the times i’ve had people trying to bust down my door looking for one of you guys? trust me, i can tell when someone’s outside.” she doesn’t look up from her book, and danny can just make out the title “ _between heaven and earth_ ” before she scrunches her knees up against it to make more room for him. “did you need me to patch you up? go on some crazy ass adventure? tell you that you’re doing the right thing, taking over for daredevil?”

he starts at this, running nervous fingers through disheveled curls. “how did you know about that?”

“i know a lot more than you think.” for the first time since he entered, claire glances up at him, her eyebrows raised. something about that look tells danny that her informant was another of the few danny trusted to let near him.

“luke.” she nods her affirmation of his guess before hunching back up, nose poked deep in her book. silence sits on them for a moment as she reads, and he considers her. of all the people to bind the DEFENDERS together, who would have guessed it would be her? she isn’t extraordinary in the ways that they are, with their abilities and their legacies. she’s another sort of SPECIAL, made of something that could walk through hell and not perish, able to be the voice of reason in a hurricane of chaos.

“claire, am i doing the right thing?” his voice is soft, his eyes averted from hers, instead watching the slight shift of her feet under the blanket. “taking over for matt, i mean. is this what i’m supposed to be doing?”

“why wouldn’t it be? you didn’t have a problem jumping in as soon as he left.” he’s noticed she does this. she doesn’t say dead or died. _he left_ , she says, as though expecting he will return. it drives jessica up the wall, though luke makes no comment on it. he’s never asked claire about how she knows matt, despite the curiosity that eats at him. (  _it isn’t his business, colleen always reminds him. don’t stir up trouble_. )

“the last city i was sworn to protect crumbled, claire. everyone in k’un lun was slaughtered. what if that happens here? what if the cities that i love are cursed to fall?” when he finally forces his eyes up to meet hers, he knows they’re wide with fear, but he can’t help the vulnerability in his features. 

claire sighs as she finally sets her book aside. her arms drape over her knees as she leans forward, studying him. she takes so long to respond, that for a moment, he wishes he could recall the words back into his mind where they are safe from her examination. however, there is no use in that, so he twists his hands in his lap until she finally speaks.

“you know, when i first started hanging around matt, i could see myself falling in love with him.” danny found his brow furrowing at the new, but not unexpected information. “i believed in what he was doing for the city. he saved kids, young girls, people who couldn’t take care of themselves. every night in the e.r., people would tell me about the devil’s of hell’s kitchen: the man who saved their lives from this or that. he did a lot good for the city.”

she pauses, her gaze drifting to the curtain fluttering lazily in the chill autumn breeze. “so what happened?” danny prompts gently, refocusing her back on the story and the matter at hand. she sighs, waving a hand in the air.

“all these damn heroics go to your head, danny. all of you think you have to be martyrs for your cause. matt was willing to let his humanity go in order to defeat the monsters he hated. i didn’t want to watch him do that to himself. i didn’t want to fall in love with a man becoming own demons.”

a moment of silence passes over them, and danny finds his mind’s eye lingering on the image of matthew murdock, beaten bloody. danny ruffles his golden curls with one hand before leaning his chin into his hand. it’s then that claire’s eyes turn back to him. “i don’t want to watch anyone go through the same thing all over again, danny. not you, not luke, not even jessica.”

“i understand,” he begins, only to be cut off.

“ _that said_ , this city does need a hero, danny. i mean, you saw what the hand did. and it scares the hell out of me thinking that someone else could come along and do the same things all over. we lived in a crazy, fucked up world. i think us normal people would sleep better at night knowing that someone’s on our side. and that’s the whole point, isn’t it? helping people that can’t help themselves?” one side of her mouth turns up in a half smile, and danny’s lips press together in a thoughtful expression.

the _ding!_ of claire’s phone startles both of them. the immortal iron fist, protector of k’un lun, and now new york, leans back on claire temple’s dusty old couch and heaves a sigh. she rolls her eyes at him with amusement as she picks up her phone from the coffee table. danny runs a hand over his face as he stores her words away for more thought. can he really defend this city without becoming something he hates if matt couldn’t? 

“oh my god.” claire’s quiet astonishment shakes him out of his reverie. danny sits bolt upright, eyes wide as he takes in claire, her mouth open as she gapes at the phone in her hand. “they found matt. he’s alive.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> let me know what you think!

**Author's Note:**

> this is my first fic for the defenders, so let me know what you think! after this i'm going to try to do a chapter for each of danny's relationships with each character, and see how it evolves from there. i don't really have a plan: this just sprung into my head randomly.


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